This revised second edition is improved linguistically with multiple increases of the number of figures and the inclusion of several novel chapters such as actin filaments during matrix invasion, microtubuli during migration and matrix invasion, nuclear deformability during migration and matrix invasion, and the active role of the tumor stroma in regulating cell invasion.

Recent years have witnessed an increasing number of theoretical and experimental contributions to cancer research from different fields of physics, from biomechanics and soft-condensed matter physics to the statistical mechanics of complex systems. Reviewing these contributions and providing a sophisticated overview of the topic, this is the first book devoted to the emerging interdisciplinary field of cancer physics. Systematically integrating approaches from physics and biology, it includes topics such as cancer initiation and progression, metastasis, angiogenesis, cancer stem cells, tumor immunology, cancer cell mechanics and migration. Biological hallmarks of cancer are presented in an intuitive yet comprehensive way, providing graduate-level students and researchers in physics with a thorough introduction to this important subject. The impact of the physical mechanisms of cancer are explained through analytical and computational models, making this an essential reference for cancer biologists interested in cutting-edge quantitative tools and approaches coming from physics.

Cancer deaths per capita have decreased in recent years, but the improvement is attributed to prevention, not treatment. The difficulty in treating cancer may be due to its 'complexity', in the mathematical physics sense of the word. Tumors evolve and spread in response to internal and external factors that involve feedback mechanisms and nonlinear behavior. Investigations of the nonlinear interactions among cells, and between cells and their environment, are crucial for developing a sufficiently detailed understanding of the system's emergent phenomenology to be able to control the behavior. In the case of cancer, controlling the system's behavior will mean the ability to treat and cure the disease. Physicists have been studying various complex, nonlinear systems for many years using a variety of techniques. These investigations have provided insights that allow physicists to make unique contributions towards the treatment of cancer.This interdisciplinary book presents recent advancements in physicists' research on cancer. The work presented in this volume uses a variety of physical, biochemical, mathematical, theoretical, and computational techniques to gain a deeper molecular and cellular understanding of the horrific disease that is cancer.

The onset of cancer presents one of the most fundamental problems in modern biology. In Dynamics of Cancer, Steven Frank produces the first comprehensive analysis of how particular genetic and environmental causes influence the age of onset. The book provides a unique conceptual and historical framework for understanding the causes of cancer and other diseases that increase with age. Using a novel quantitative framework of reliability and multistage breakdown, Frank unifies molecular, demographic, and evolutionary levels of analysis. He interprets a wide variety of observations on the age of cancer onset, the genetic and environmental causes of disease, and the organization of tissues with regard to stem cell biology and somatic mutation. Frank uses new quantitative methods to tackle some of the classic problems in cancer biology and aging: how the rate of increase in the incidence of lung cancer declines after individuals quit smoking, the distinction between the dosage of a chemical carcinogen and the time of exposure, and the role of inherited genetic variation in familial patterns of cancer. This is the only book that presents a full analysis of the age of cancer onset. It is a superb teaching tool and a rich source of ideas for new and experienced researchers. For cancer biologists, population geneticists, evolutionary biologists, and demographers interested in aging, this book provides new insight into disease progression, the inheritance of predisposition to disease, and the evolutionary processes that have shaped organismal design.

Modern cancer research is a high-tech undertaking, overlapping with many fields in the physical sciences. These include nanotechnology, engineering, immunology, and bioinformatics. This book focuses on the science and technology underlying the diagnosis and treatement of cancer. The authors offer insights into technologies including radiotherapy, modelling, and drug encapsulation.

The scientific and clinical foundations of Radiation Therapy are cross-disciplinary. This book endeavours to bring together the physics, the radiobiology, the main clinical aspects as well as available clinical evidence behind Radiation Therapy, presenting mutual relationships between these disciplines and their role in the advancements of radiation oncology.

The papers collected in this hugely useful volume cover the principle physical and biological aspects of radiation therapy and in addition, address practical clinical considerations in the planning and delivering of that therapy. The importance of the assessment of uncertainties is emphasized. Topics include an overview of the physics of the interactions of radiation with matter and the definition of the goals and the design of radiation therapy approaches.

There is something special about cancer compared to other diseases. It is a horrific disease that has defied attempts to find a reliable cure. Life spans after diagnosis have increased, but the mortality rate has remained about the same even after 40 years of extensive research. Cancer provides a major scientific challenge. Tumors evolve and spread in response to internal and external factors that involve feed-back mechanisms and non-linear behavior. In recent years, physicists have become involved in studying cancer, with the ultimate aim of finding a cure. Physicists approach a problem with unique experimental, theoretical, and computational skills and perspectives. This book will be comprised of chapters written by physicists from all over the world who perform research on cancer. They will describe their research and summarize their results.